Isle of Man ISP Manx Boost FTTC to 200Mbps and Prep 1Gbps FTTP Broadband

The primary telecoms provider for the Isle of Man (British Crown Dependency), Manx Telecom, has confirmed that they intend to begin the roll-out of a new 1Gbps “ultrafast” Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) broadband network during the second half of 2017 and will boost FTTC speeds to 200Mbps.

At present the operator has already invested £10 million in fibre based broadband technologies since 2011, which has helped their ‘up to’ 80Mbps (10Mbps upload) capable Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) technology to reach 93% of the islands premises. So far this service has delivered a strong 45% penetration of their customer base. Some 99% of the island can also now access their 4G (LTE) Mobile network.

Last month the operator announced that this VDSL2 network would be upgraded to use the latest VDSL Plus (VPlus) technology, which will increase the top speeds to 200Mbps by introducing both Vectoring (reduces cross-talk interference) and a 35MHz profile (existing 80Mbps subscribers will also be boosted to 100Mbps). In the UK BT has shunned this technically tedious approach in favour of skipping to ultrafast G.fast.

However the big announcement was the confirmation that Manx are on-course to begin the roll-out of their new “full fibre” FTTP broadband network to an initial 77 locations, which will start life by covering “key business districts and industrial estates“. The service will also be available in the Reeyt Ny Sheear and Hampton Farm estates, which are residential areas.

Kevin Paige, Manx Telecom’s CTO and CIO, said:

“We are formally launching our Ultrafast Fibre Broadband service via FTTP technology which continues to build on our goal of extending our fibre network, and the ultimate extension of that strategy is to provide fibre right into the homes and businesses on the Island. This means even faster speeds for the Island.

With 93% of customers already in reach of a Superfast Fibre Broadband street cabinet on the Island, we are seeing a lot of people taking advantage of our Superfast Fibre Broadband services. With our latest services, residents and businesses will be able to enjoy even more high-bandwidth activity at the same time, including uploads and downloads, video streaming and conferencing, gaming and other online services.

We will be monitoring take-up of these new services closely, with a view to expanding Ultrafast Fibre Broadband coverage further in 2018 and beyond.”

The first 77 locations to benefit from the new FTTP service have been listed below.